A Tale of 40 Cities: a Preliminary Analysis of Equity Impacts of COVID-19 Service Adjustments Across North America July 2020 Mc
A tale of 40 cities: A preliminary analysis of equity impacts of COVID-19 service adjustments across North America James DeWeese, Leila Hawa, Hanna Demyk, Zane Davey, Anastasia Belikow, and Ahmed El-Geneidy July 2020 McGill University Abstract To cope with COVID-19 confinement measures and precipitous declines in ridership, public transport agencies across North America have made significant adjustments to their services, slashing trip frequency in many areas while increasing it in others. These adjustments, especially service cuts, appear to have disproportionately affected areas where lower income and more- vulnerable groups reside in North American Cities. This paper compares changes in service frequency across 30 U.S. and 10 Canadian cities, linking these changes to average income levels and a vulnerability index. The study highlights the wide range of service outcomes while underscoring the potential for best practices that explicitly account for vertical equity, or social justice, in their impacts when adjusting service levels. Research Question and Data Public transport ridership in North American Cities declined dramatically by the end of March 2020 as governments applied confinement measures in response to COVID-19 pandemic (Hart, 2020; Vijaya, 2020). In an industry that depends heavily on fare-box recovery to pay for operations and sometimes infrastructure loans (Verbich, Badami, & El-Geneidy, 2017), transport agencies faced major financial strains, even as the pandemic magnified their role as a critical public service, ferrying essential, often low-income, workers with limited alternatives to their jobs (Deng, Morissette, & Messacar, 2020). Public transport agencies also faced major operating difficulties due to absenteeism among operators (Hamilton Spectator, 2020) and enhanced cleaning protocols.
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